{"id":28,"date":"2014-06-09T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-06-09T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/2014\/06\/09\/sunday-30th-september-2012-cut-off-that-which-causes-you-to-stumble\/"},"modified":"2014-06-09T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2014-06-09T00:00:00","slug":"sunday-30th-september-2012-cut-off-that-which-causes-you-to-stumble","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/2014\/06\/09\/sunday-30th-september-2012-cut-off-that-which-causes-you-to-stumble\/","title":{"rendered":"Sunday 30th September 2012 &#8211; Cut off that which causes you to stumble"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"imgPusher\" style=\"float:left;height:0px\"><\/span><span style=\"z-index:10;position:relative;float:left;;clear:left;margin-top:0px;*margin-top:0px\"><a><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/theword-this-week.weebly.com\/\/uploads\/4\/1\/5\/2\/4152650\/7886532.jpg?255\" style=\"margin-top: 5px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 10px; border-width:1px;padding:3px;\" alt=\"Picture\" class=\"galleryImageBorder\"><\/a><\/p>\n<div style=\"display: block; font-size: 90%; margin-top: -10px; margin-bottom: 10px; text-align: center;\">Our little girl after he baptism &#8211; she is excited to be on God&#8217;s team!<\/div>\n<p><\/span> <\/p>\n<div class=\"paragraph\" style=\"text-align:left;display:block;\"><font size=\"4\"><strong>The Word This Week:<\/strong><\/font><br \/><span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul style=\"\">\n<li style=\"\"><a title=\"\" style=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu\/texts.php?id=221#hebrew_reading\">Esther 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22<\/a> and <a title=\"\" style=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu\/texts.php?id=221#psalm_reading\">Psalm 124<\/a>\u00a0 OR<\/li>\n<li style=\"\"><a title=\"\" style=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu\/texts.php?id=221#hebrew_oth_reading\">Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29<\/a> and <a title=\"\" style=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu\/texts.php?id=221#psalm_oth_reading\">Psalm 19:7-14<\/a>\u00a0 <\/li>\n<li style=\"\"><a title=\"\" style=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu\/texts.php?id=221#epistle_reading\">James 5:13-20<\/a>\u00a0 <\/li>\n<li style=\"\"><a title=\"\" style=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu\/texts.php?id=221#gospel_reading\">Mark 9:38-50<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><font size=\"4\"><strong><span>Thoughts On The Word:<\/span><\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span>This week our family got to celebrate something wonderful.\u00a0 Today our 5 year old girl was baptised, at her own request into the Kingdom of God.\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p><span>You might wonder how this fits with today&#8217;s readings&#8230; Well the key message we should take from our Gospel reading for today is that we should allow <em>nothing<\/em> to stand in the way of us entering and staying in the Kingdom of God, and that we should let <em>nothing<\/em> we do cause others to stumble and lose there own opportunity for citizenship in the Kingdom.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Many may wonder why, if we decided against infant baptism did we allow our daughter to be baptised as a 5 year old, when she would still have a relatively elemental understanding of what it means.\u00a0 Well a big part of it\u00a0 was because she expressed a desire to do it! She wanted to be baptised, and what right do my wife and I have to erect a barrier between her and the Kingdom? Her perception of what she did today is that she told God that she loves Him too, and that she wants to be a part of His family, and that the baptism was a way of being welcomed officially into that family.\u00a0 What a wonderfully simple and yet profound <\/span>understanding of the sacrament!<\/p>\n<p><span>Given the big day and the preparation for it this week, I have very little else to offer this week.\u00a0 I ask that you simply reflect on Jesus&#8217; words in the Gospel and ask yourself, are you holding yourself or someone else back from the Kingdom? Why? &#8230; If you have an answer for why, there is a good chance you should &#8216;hang a millstone around it and cast it into the sea&#8217;&#8230; or maybe just make the conscious decision to put the kingdom first.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>God bless.<\/span><br \/><span>Daryl.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><br \/><span><\/span><br \/><span><\/span><br \/><span><\/span><\/div>\n<hr style=\"width:100%;clear:both;visibility:hidden;\">\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Our little girl after he baptism &#8211; she is excited to be on God&#8217;s team! The Word This Week: Esther 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22 and Psalm 124\u00a0 OR Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29 and Psalm 19:7-14\u00a0 James 5:13-20\u00a0 Mark 9:38-50 Thoughts On The Word: This week our family got to celebrate something wonderful.\u00a0 Today our 5 year &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/2014\/06\/09\/sunday-30th-september-2012-cut-off-that-which-causes-you-to-stumble\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Sunday 30th September 2012 &#8211; Cut off that which causes you to stumble&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewordthisweek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}